Kompleted: Kim Sewalong Dress

Sorry for the title I couldn't resist.

 

I was sewing along with the Kim sewalong over at the BHL blog and today I would like to share my finished Kim. I actually have two copies of this pattern. I wasn't expecting the Kim dress as part of my kickstarter bundle, so when I saw it on pre-sale I snapped it up. I think something about their decision to stop printing the Georgia dress meant that they substituted Kim. No matter. Whatever happens the spare one will not go to waste!

I Totally added pockets to this dress! - A variation on the emery pockets, sewn into the waistline

The fabric for this dress was bought in the sale at John Lewis and is a Hemingway design which is 100 % cotton and cost around £5 /m I can't remember the exact price (I saw it subsequently in another fabric store for about £12/m so bargain!!). I bought 2 m of this fabric and used only about 1.5 m. I then cut the rest into lots of varying sized squares which I plan on using within a quilt. The other remnants have been set aside for another (still secret) project ;-). I love it when this happens as then it seems like the next project is free!

I made up a muslin of this dress using the wrap skirt around Christmas however was never too happy with the resultant fit. I transferred a few changes onto the pattern pieces however I think I still require more :-(. The muslin was mostly OK - from a few days wear I assessed that the back neckline needed a little more taking in and the straps were a little too long.

Take 2 has resulted in a dress which fitted pretty good until it came to my bust - I removed a wedge the first time which left a still gaping back so then returned and removed a little more. The dress was now an inch too narrow! I unpicked the zip and it now sits on the very edge of the fabric so I'll need to remember this if I make it up again. The tops of the straps were sewn with a 3/4" seam allowance which meant the outcome was a little snug around the back of my shoulder so maybe next time I'll drop the armseye a little? They are however the correct length now. So there's that. I think the sweetheart needs a little bit of a raise too - this isn't an unusual bra for me so the fact you can see the top of the bra suggests that this needs raising a touch. nothing major though.

The straps of this dress are still sitting too wide on my shoulders so thats another reason why you get a great view of my bra. What I'm thinking if I make version 3 is to take some width out of the CF side seams and then add it back in to the side seam of the SF piece. Another method I'm toying with is to try a narrow shoulder adjustment - however I'm not 100 % convinced that this will fix the issue as the base of the arms is still very wide. Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

One other change that I'm toying with making is to make a small sway back adjustment. This adjustment makes sense as taking the length out of the straps has lifted the waistline so that it now sits on my natural waist however seems to dip by the time the seam hits the middle of my back and bags out a little. another slight disclaimer: I made a slight error in cutting my skirt fabric - I measured the length from my waist to my knee and cut this length. Completely omitting seam allowances and hem allowances. Ooops!! So its a Kim Mini really....

So I'm mostly happy :-D however it seems that by the time the fit is 'just so' this will no longer be the Kim dress :-p. This is still very much a wearable dress although I am a bit annoyed at the zip  - it seems to line up ok at the seams however as I always find when I buy poorer quality John Lewis zips I can never get the zip invisible. *Jennifer learn from this*!!!

Did anyone else been taking part in the Kim Sew Along?

Have a good weekend all :-) (I'm currently waiting for my parents to get up so we can go on some advnture in Glasgow somewhere!)

JCS xx